Dead of Night
by leahalexis
Summary: B/S, set between Smashed and Wrecked. REVISED.


Disclaimer: the usual. I don't own anything, and I never claimed to.  
  
  
  
Set between Smashed and Wrecked.  
  
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Dead of Night  
  
  
  
It was the dead of night and Slayer's eyes were restless.  
  
The moon was full; the roof, collapsed around them, let in the jagged-edged night and the clouds, travelling across the gaps, cast shadows that left her skin ash gray. He slid a hand over her bare thighs, onto one cooling hip, and shuddered.  
  
"Again."  
  
One of them said it. One of them reached out, and they were together again, his hands braced on her hips. The floorboards groaned. She cried out, dug her fingers into his shoulders. They fought each other for control. Lost.  
  
"Buffy. . ."  
  
His breath—hers, breathed into his lungs—was a sob in his throat.  
  
"Don't."  
  
"What?"  
  
She'd stopped. Her forehead was pressed against his chest, her breath still fast, still harsh. She was trembling.  
  
"Don't say my name."  
  
"I love you."  
  
Her eyes jerked up to his. "Stop it!"  
  
"I can't."  
  
"Get off of me."  
  
He rolled them, pinned her to the floor. Drove home. Watched her eyes, watched the shock fill them again. "Make me."  
  
"I hate you," she sobbed, shuddering as he began to move, clinging to him. "I hate you."  
  
"Hate me all you like, love." His eyes burned. He held her arms above her head, set his teeth to the juncture between her neck and shoulder. "I've had you now, Slayer," he grunted against her skin. "I'll have you again. And again. And you'll love it."  
  
Her head collided with his, and she shoved him back off of her. "Bloody hell!" he managed as his back hit the floor. She sprung to her feet first, pushed him flat against the concrete, hand tight against his neck.  
  
They were centimeters apart. She was shaking.  
  
"You're dead," she spat.  
  
"I know, love. Been that way a hundred years now."  
  
She tightened her grip on his throat.  
  
He laughed, sneered up at her. "Who are you trying to fool, sweetheart? You know what I am. What you are."  
  
Her face turned to stone. Her eyes were empty. "I hate you." She gave him a last vicious shove and let go. Turned around and started pulling on clothing. Her skirt, fighting with the zipper. One boot.  
  
He dragged himself up into a sitting position, leaned back on his hands. Quietly, he asked, "Then why are you here?"  
  
"Because I can't find my other shoe." She spun around, searching, finally found it underneath a fallen beam. She tugged, and it came free.  
  
"Buffy." His voice was hoarse.  
  
She stopped, boot in hand, and looked back at him. He was standing.  
  
"Please." He struggled with the word, moved towards her. "Don't do this. Not yet."  
  
"I'm not doing anything." She yanked on the boot. "Except leaving."  
  
"Tomorrow," he said. "Do it tomorrow."  
  
She hesitated.  
  
"Buffy. Please. Just not yet."  
  
She touched his cheek, her expression clouded. Watching her face, he knelt, took off one boot, then the other, slid the skirt back off her hips.  
  
"I love you," he said.  
  
She didn't speak.  
  
*  
  
"None of it's real," she whispered, and his arms tightened around her.  
  
"It is, love."  
  
"It's not. It's not." She chanted it. "And I can't make it real. I thought. . . I thought if I just did everything the way I used to, if I patrolled, if I took care of Dawn, that everything would just go back to normal."  
  
"But it didn't."  
  
"It's all still the same. The same," her breath hitched, "as it was before." Her eyes were huge and dark and young in the fragility of her face. He could barely hear her when she spoke. "You were right. I came back wrong. But I was already wrong to begin with."  
  
"Buffy. . ." He closed his eyes, rested his forehead on the top of her head. She was so small against him, so small in his arms.  
  
"Before. Before I jumped. Life was already hell. That's not the worst part. It's the coming back to it that hurts, coming back and finding that nothing's changed. At least not in me."  
  
She was silent for a long time. When he finally pulled away to look at her, she was crying. He only knew because the tears caught the moonlight as they spilled over her bottom lashes. Her face was blank, her gaze far away.  
  
"I don't know what to do," she said. The sound of her voice was broken, hollow. "Life goes on. But I don't. I can't."  
  
After a moment, she turned, and her eyes focused on his face. "Spike. . ." she said.  
  
He cleared his throat. "Yeah, pet?"  
  
She lifted her mouth to his. "Just make me forget."  
  
*  
  
He called out to her as she left: "You'll be back, Slayer."  
  
She would. He rubbed where her fist had connected with his chin.  
  
It was the only place for her to go. 


End file.
